


if you can't handle the heat, get out of the kitchen

by PersasseusJacksasson



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Bad Cooking, Crack, Fluff and Crack, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Hilarious, I'm Bad At Tagging, Seriously get them out of the kitchen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:06:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27524299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PersasseusJacksasson/pseuds/PersasseusJacksasson
Summary: “It looks crispy,” Izzy remarked in an attempt to be optimistic.“I think we burned it. It probably tastes like ash.” Alec groaned. “Not that I have ever tried eating ash,” he added as an afterthought.Izzy took another glance inside the pan, and beamed. “Crispy food is delicious, like fried chicken, chips and fries. I’m sure mom would love it.”Based on Shadowhunters 3x03. A short fic about Alec and Izzy being complete disasters in the kitchen
Relationships: Alec Lightwood & Isabelle Lightwood
Kudos: 12





	if you can't handle the heat, get out of the kitchen

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: “This is an old family recipe, Izzy and I found it right after my grandmother died. My mother was inconsolable, until the day we made her this stew. That was the first time that I saw her smile.” -Shadowhunters 3x03
> 
> Set before Jace comes to live with Alec and Izzy. Alec is 10 and Izzy is 8. The prompt is from the show but it’s set in the books because I didn’t want any other Shadowhunters in the institute. Keep in mind that I don’t know anything about cooking either.

Alec Lightwood rifled through the cupboard, searching for a suitably shaped pot. A rustle caught his attention, and he turned to see his sister, Izzy, flipping through a file filled with colourful papers.

Izzy bit her lip, her dark brown eyes narrowed in concentration. She was looking for the recipe for the Lightwood stew. It was a difficult job, considering that the file was filled with numerous recipes.

Alec continued rummaging through the cabinet looking for the pot that Mom had used when she had cooked the stew for them a month ago, just before their grandmother died and Mom had hidden away in her room for days. She didn’t even come out for meals, and Dad had brought a bowl of chicken soup into her room.

Alec and Izzy planned to rectify that by making some stew for her. The two of them had spent days flipping through the multiple recipe books, until Hodge had pointed out the right one. He had offered them help afterwards, but Izzy had declined indignantly, claiming that they were Shadowhunters and that they could make something as simple as stew, which Alec supposed was true.

He moved on to the next cupboard, shifting pots and pans to look for his Mom’s pot. Theoretically, any pot should work, but he wanted it to be _perfect._

"Found it!" Izzy cried out triumphantly. She ripped a page out of the file, and waved it in his face.

"I still haven't found the pot," Alec reported mournfully. Izzy crouched beside him and peeked into the cupboard. With an exaggerated sigh, she stuffed her hand inside and pulled out a frying pan.

"This should work." She stood up with a huff and started messing with the stove. Alec shrugged, rising to stand beside her. His sister was extremely smart, surely she was right.

"I should get the ingredients,” Alec decided as he gently plucked the recipe from Izzy’s grip. He started skimming over the recipe, mentally listing the ingredients they would need.

_BEEF STEW_

_Directions_

  * _In a large pot over medium heat, heat oil. Add beef and cook until seared on all sides, 10 minutes, working in batches if necessary. Transfer beef to a plate._


  * _In the same pot, cook onion, carrots, and celery until soft. Season with salt and pepper. Add garlic and tomato paste and cook until garlic is fragrant and tomato paste has darkened, 2 minutes._


  * _Add beef back to pot then add broth, wine, Worcestershire sauce, thyme, and bay leaves._


  * _Bring to a boil then reduce heat to a simmer. Season with salt and pepper. Cover and let simmer until beef is tender, 30 minutes_.


  * _Add potatoes and simmer, covered, until potatoes are tender, 15 minutes._


  * _Remove bay leaves. Stir in peas and cook until warmed through, 2 minutes. Garnish with parsley before serving._



The beef was easy enough to find, it was in the freezer. It was still frozen, so Alec transferred it to a plate and stuck it in the microwave, setting the timer for twelve minutes. He then located onions, carrots and celery in the fridge, and the salt and pepper in a cupboard. He found that Izzy was still trying to figure out how to turn on the stove; she was on her knees, trying to figure out the mechanics of the stove.

“Need help?” he offered. She nodded vigorously. He examined the stove, furrowing his eyebrows in concentration. He found a dial marked with ‘OFF’, ‘L’, ‘M’, and ‘’H’. He turned the dial right, pausing at ‘M’.

Izzy grabbed a bottle of vegetable oil off a top shelf, and dumped nearly half the contents into the pan. Alec removed the plate of defrosted beef from the microwave and moved it to the pan, before covering it with the lid.

“Will you braid my hair while passing time?” Izzy asked, already pulling out combs and hair ties, knowing he wouldn’t object. 

He sat her down on a stool by the dining table, gently brushing her long, silky dark hair. Separating a big section of hair, he split it into three different sections and started interlacing them. His fingers nimbly braided the hair, an action he had done everyday throughout the past week.

He was tying the end of the braid when Izzy suddenly sniffed.

“Do you smell burning?” she asked.

Indeed, the unpleasant smell of burnt beef filled the air, and smoke was wafting into the kitchen. The two siblings stared at each other in horror, before racing towards the kitchen. Izzy pulled the pan off of the fire and opened the lid. She coughed as smoke puffed up in front of her, and waved a hand in front of her face.

“It looks crispy,” Izzy remarked in an attempt to be optimistic.

“I think we burned it. It probably tastes like ash.” Alec groaned. “Not that I have ever tried eating ash,” he added as an afterthought.

Izzy took another glance inside the pan, and beamed. “Crispy food is delicious, like fried chicken, chips and fries. I’m sure Mom would love it.”

Alec shrugged, his sister was smarter than him in Science, and food is related to Science, so Alec assumed that she was right.

She had already scraped the charred beef into another plate, and was dropping a whole carrot into the pan. She put in entire onions and celery before she snapped the lid shut again.

Reading the recipe that he had left on the table, Izzy exclaimed, “We need garlic, tomato paste, broth, wine, thyme, wine, bay leaves and _wer-worcatsher_ sauce.”

“Worcestershire sauce,” Alec corrected, already opening various cabinets and looking for the ingredients. The garlic, broth, thyme, and bay leaves were easy to find, they were hidden inside the various cupboards. 

“I can’t find any tomatoes, or the Worcestershire sauce,” he announced after looking through all the cupboards at least three times. “And we’re not allowed to look through Mom’s wine cabinet.”

“Live a little, Alec,” Izzy whined, “Besides it’s for a good cause.”

He seemed to consider it for a moment, before relenting.

“As for the tomatoes and sauce,” Izzy continued nonchalantly, “Apples look nearly the same as tomatoes, so they must taste the same too. And whatever sauce we use doesn’t matter, because sauce is sauce, big brother.”

“When you’re right, you’re right,” Alec muttered as he grabbed a few apples. Izzy headed over to the shelf and glanced at the array of sauces. 

Izzy grabbed a random bottle; to Alec’s horror, the label read ‘sour cream’; and placed it on the table besides all the other ingredients.

“Are you sure sour cream—?” He started, but glanced around and saw Izzy climbing the counter and reaching for the wine shelf. She couldn’t reach, so she climbed down and reached under the counter where she had stashed the seven inch heels Alec had bought for her last week.

She pulled them on before climbing up the counter again, swaying a bit as she held out her arms for balance.

“Are you sure you can reach it? We can just not use it.” Alec glanced worriedly at his sister. 

She grunted in frustration as she failed to reach the wine cabinet. “Yes...we need...it,” she panted, attempting another swipe for the cabinet door. 

“I'm pretty sure it’s locked anyways,” Alec murmured quietly to himself. 

Suddenly, Izzy yelped as she tripped over her heels. She came crashing down and it was only with her lightning fast reflexes that she managed to maneuver her body to land in a roll.

“You alright, Iz?” Alec hurried over to her side worriedly. He checked her over for injuries, sighing in relief when he found none. 

When he glanced at her, he saw that she had a crazed glint in her eye, which meant that she either had an amazing idea, or a catastrophic one. 

“Well if we can’t use wine, we’ll just have to blend some grapes to make grape juice,” she suggested in a voice that left no room for argument.

“I don’t think that’s…,” he tried anyways.

“Trust me, big bro,” Izzy assured him.

Alec shrugged, “What could go wrong?”

He went to find some grapes while Izzy checked on the pan to find that the vegetables they had dumped in earlier had softened. She added the rest of the ingredients, using a mixer (“We’re supposed to be mixing, Alec, so we should use a mixer.”) to mix them together.

He remembered dad buying some grapes last week and quickly located it in the fruit basket. He tossed a bunch in the blender and waited two minutes before sieving it. He dumped the juice in the pan Izzy continued mixing. The stew turned into a weird magenta chunky paste, which looked absolutely disgusting, but it was supposed to look that way, right?

They waited for it to boil while playing tic-tac-toe, which always ended with a tie since the both of them are geniuses. Finally, air bubbles appeared on the surface of the stew and Alec reduced the heat. 

“Iz, can you add two, three spoons of salt, and add the same amount of pepper will you?” Alec called out.

He went to get the rest of the ingredients: the potatoes and the peas. Not finding any peas, he decided to take a leaf out of Izzy’s book and grab a box of Trix cereal. They were both snacks, circular, and they both go in liquids like stew and milk, Alec reasoned.

He returned to the kitchen to hear Izzy muttering under her breath while adding spoonfuls of pepper. “Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three!”

Alec figured he must have misheard her.

Izzy grabbed the lid of the pan and covered it. 

They played UNO while waiting, setting a timer to ensure ‘the beef accident’ did not happen again. Their game ended when Alec made Izzy draw 12 cards and she threw her cards down in frustration.

Once the timer rang, they added the potatoes and covered the pan again for the next fifteen minutes.

Finally, they added the cereal ‘peas’ and stirred it for two minutes. Finally, _finally,_ their stew was cooked.

“It doesn’t look very edible,” Alec peered into the pan. The stew had become a light magenta, with blobs of sour cream that had been impossible to mix in. He spotted a full carrot and traces of a black substance that was either charred beef or ash. And it smelled absolutely terrible, like rotten eggs except they didn’t put any eggs inside. “Should we try it first?

“It’s for Mom, Alec,” Izzy chastised, “And besides, we followed the recipe precisely, word for word, it should taste amazing.” 

Izzy was beaming widely as she scooped some of the gooey stew into a bowl using a ladle. She reached for the dial and turned it right, to the letter ‘H’, intending to turn it off.

“Have you turned off the stove, Iz?” Alec questioned while transferring the rest of the stew into a plastic container and stuffing it in the fridge. 

“Just did,” she assured. Setting the bowl of stew aside, she started to wash the pan, mixer and ladle.

When Alec reached for the container of salt to return it to the cupboard, he accidentally knocked over the vegetable oil. It spilled everywhere, dousing everything in oil.

“I’ll just clean this later,” he decided, thinking it was safe since the stove was off.

Izzy gingerly carried the bowl towards Mom’s room, Alec trailing behind her.

She attempted to kick the door open, but it was locked. Sighing, she held the bowl with one hand and used her free hand to rap loudly on the door.

“Mooommmm,” she called. “Open the door please.”

She waited a full minute before knocking incessantly. 

“Izzy, I don’t think you should,” Alec attempted to stop her but the door swung open.

Mom looked horrible. She had dark eyebags and her eyes were red from crying. Her hair was a mess and she looked like she hadn’t bathed in weeks.

“We made some stew for you,” Izzy spoke in a chipper voice, completely oblivious to the state their mother was in.

Mom knelt down in front of Izzy. “Thank you, Isabelle, but I’m afraid that is not necessa—,” her words were cut off as Izzy stuffed a spoonful of stew into her open mouth.

Mom’s eyes widened with _awe? wonder?_ She grimaced, probably from the smell, but Alec was sure that the stew tasted wonderful.

She grimaced again, shutting her eyes tight as she choked for breath. At last, she regained her composure and attempted to smile at them, which looked more like a wince.

“That was,” she started, but broke into a coughing fit. 

“Absolutely delicious?” Izzy suggested.

Mom just nodded.

“We can bring you more,” Alec proposed.

Mom paled. “You should leave some for your father and Hodge.”

Mom took the bowl from Izzy and set it on the table, as far away from them as possible to try and avoid the repulsive smell.

“We can make more,” Izzy piped up, grinning toothily.

Before Mom could answer, the ground shook, and the fire alarms began ringing shrilly. 

“What’s..?” Mom started, but she was interrupted by Hodge barging into the room.

“FIRE IN THE KITCHEN!!” he exclaimed loudly.

Alec and Izzy shared a look. 

“Didn’t you turn the stove off?” Alec asked, already knowing the answer.

“Yeah, I turned the dial to the right. That’s how you turn it off, right?”

“Izzy, you just turned the heat up _higher_ ,” Alec facepalmed. Then, he realized and blinked, horrified. “And I spilled vegetable oil all over the counter.”

“Oops.”

Mom sighed exasperatedly.

**Author's Note:**

> Review please.
> 
> Recipe from https://www.delish.com/cooking/recipe-ideas/a23515497/easy-beef-stew-recipe/ because I don’t know shit about cooking.


End file.
